Sitting in church parking lot 11 PM Thursday picking dried glue stick residue off my jeans wondering what possessed me to think organizing kids ministry talent show was good idea.
Three months ago seemed so simple. Kids love performing right? Parents love watching their kids perform. How hard could it be?
Really hard turns out. Like "questioning life choices while scraping glitter off sanctuary pews" hard.
Started when Marcus stood up during prayer time and started belting "This Little Light of Mine" like auditioning for American Idol. Other kids joined in. My disaster Sunday morning turned into beautiful chaotic worship moment.
That's when idea hit me. These kids have gifts. Real gifts. Maybe they need chance to use them.
Mentioned it to children's pastor. She got that look. The "sounds like lot of work but kids would love it" look. Two weeks later standing in front of thirty kids asking who wanted to be in talent show.
Every single hand went up. Should've been my first clue I was in over my head.
Need to talk about Frozen for minute. When you announce talent show to elementary kids first thing that happens is every girl between four and ten decides this is their moment to become Elsa.
Twelve different girls wanted to perform "Let It Go." Twelve. One mom approached me with incredibly serious expression saying "Melody's been working on Elsa costume since last Halloween. She's been waiting for this moment."
How do you respond to that? "Sorry we've reached our Frozen quota"?
Created actual spreadsheet with column labeled "Disney songs" to keep track. Solution? I caved completely. We ended up with "Frozen Finale" - all twelve girls performing together. Was it chaos? Absolutely. Did parents love it? You bet.
Morning of talent show woke up to three texts. Kid one stomach flu. Kid two family emergency. Kid three forgot about soccer tournament. Carefully planned lineup completely shot.
But real chaos started when twice as many kids showed up wanting to participate than we'd planned for. What do you do? These are church kids. Can't exactly turn them away.
So didn't. Extended show threw out careful timing decided to see what happened. Honestly? Better than anything I could've planned.
For ministry leaders discovering that mess is part of ministry, volunteers learning chaos can be beautiful, anyone ready to stop controlling everything and trust God's working in middle of it all.
